 |
- Squires Home
- Store Finder
- Our People
- Our Centres
- Coffee Shops
- Special Offers
- Products
- Plant Guide
- Garden Advice
- Garden Calendar
- Events
- Contact Us
Newsletter
Get the latest Squires news and special offers direct to your email.
Opening Times
Mon-Sat: 9.00am - 6.00pm
Sun: 10.00am - 4.30pm
Please check Centre pages for individual opening times
Garden Advice
How to Grow Potatoes and Onions
Potatoes are such a versatile vegetable. January and February are the months to decide which varieties. This is so much a question of personal taste that it is difficult to make recommendations. Therefore look for a variety that you enjoy eating and that crops when you want it to. T...Read full Advice
Hedging
A hedge can give all year round interest and a wonderful texture and depth. A hedge can also provide a haven for wildlife and, if you go for something prickly, like Holly or Rosa rogusa, a deterrent for thieves. It also makes a good windbr...Read full Advice
Spring Lawn Care
There are millions of lawns in the UK serving many different purposes. Yet the bulk of British lawns just exist, without any attention whatsoever other than a mow now and again. With just a little tender loving care begun in spring the lawn can look really good for the whole of the year. G...Read full Advice
Summer Flowering Bulbs
When one thinks of bulbs it is usually the spring flowering Daffodils and Crocus that come to mind... Autumn is a good time to think about planting soft fruit. Soft fruit can be broadly divided into cane fruit such as Raspberries and bush fruit such as Gooseberries and Currants. Strawberries are the exception because they are h... There are many reasons to grow herbs. Some people make their own moth repellent bags from muslin fabric filled with dried One of the most vibrant and luxurious spring flowering shrubs must be the Camellia. It is a grown up sort of flower. It is sophisticated and elegant with glossy dark green leaves and alluring confident flowers in all shades of ... Stately purple Foxgloves look wonderful growing in the wild in hedgerows or woodlands. Digitalis ... Even before the Daffodils burst into their sunshine display the bright flowers of the Primrose family are a cheering sight, making fun of the winter gloom by flowering tenac...
Read full Advice
Dahlias for High Summer Colour
Dahlias originated in Mexico and were introduced to Europe in the Eighteenth Century by the Spanish. They are sub tropical plants which need abundant water and food to perform their best.
The Dahlia may originally have been a foreign import but many British gardeners have taken it to their hearts, n...
Read full Advice
Growing Soft Fruit
Read full Advice
Getting to Grips with Growing Media
There is a vast array of growing media available to the amateur gardener these days. So here is a basic guide to what's what in the compost world.
Read full Advice
How to Choose and Grow Herbs
Read full Advice
Camellias
Read full Advice
Magnolia
Magnolia is one of the loveliest of the early flowering shrubs and looks exotic in any garden. The magnolias are a very diverse group of plants and encompass many shapes, forms and colours.
The most familiar ...
Read full Advice
Foxgloves
Read full Advice
Forsythia
This magnificent plant is a favourite spring shrub. Profuse rather than elegant, it flowers generously in March and even when it is in bud, you can cut some branches, bring them into the warm house and you will see those delightful yellow flowers open before they do outside...
Read full Advice
How to Take Cuttings of Tender Perennials
Ever since the time that mankind stopped hunting and gathering and started farming, generation after generation has enjoyed the satisfaction of propagating plants. August is a good time of year to take cuttings of many tender perennials. Pelargoniums and tender Geraniums (Zonal Pelargoniu...
Read full Advice
How to Grow Bulbs for Indoor Flowering
A good autumn project is planting bulbs to flower indoors in time for Christmas. Time is of the essence. Prepared Hyacinths have been specially treated to promote early flowering indoors and should be planted as soon as possible after purchase. There are also several varieties of Narcissi and Tulips...
Read full Advice
Successful Container Planting
There can be little more cheerful than the sight or scent of a pot of colourful plants on the doorstep or a luxuriant hanging basket.
The secret to successful container growing is choosing the right container, the right compost and the right plants and then remembering to water and feed. The pa...
Read full Advice
Primroses
Read full Advice
Bedding and Patio Plants
The danger of late frost should be over in our area by about 11
Read full Advice
How to Grow Pinks and Carnations
Pinks to me are the country cousins of the more sophisticated florists carnations. They are not necessarily pink at all and come in a wide range of hues from white to cerise to purple and red. Pinks and Carnations belong to the genus Dianthus. Both have attractive flowers which are us...
Read full Advice
Water Conscious Gardening
Being water conservation conscious does not have to mean abandoning gardening. There are a number of things we can do as gardeners to conserve water and still enjoy a beautiful display of flowers and foliage.
Applying a mulch to the soil such as bark chips helps keep the soil beneath moist. Watering...
Read full Advice
How to Grow and Prune Wisteria
Wisteria are large, very beautiful climbers. They have long racemes of flowers in mauve, blue, pink or white and flower in late spring or early summer. Wisteria look particularly special over water and many gardening books feature photographs of them tumbling from bridges. Of course no...
Read full Advice
How to Grow Rhododendrons and Azaleas
The Rhododendron family is a very large plant family. It includes both Rhododendrons and Azaleas. In the first part of the 20th Century many species were brought to these shores from China and the Himalayas and plantsmen put a great deal of energy into making plant crosses to create the hy...
Read full Advice
Choosing, Cultivating and Pruning Roses
Over the centuries roses have had decorative, religious and political significance. Roses are seen in Ancient Egyptian jewelry dating from the Third Century BC. They became the potent political emblems of the rival factions in the wars of the Roses in the Fifteenth Ce...
Read full Advice
Autumn Lawn Care
Giving the lawn a little autumn t.l.c. really does make a difference to the way the grass copes with the winter and looks the following spring.
As the temperature drops the grass will grow more slowly and the frequency of mowing can be reduced. The height of the mower blades should also ...
Read full Advice
How to Choose Plants for Autumn Colour and Why Leaves Fall in Autumn
What can better the chilli, caramel and coffee colours of Autumn displayed by leaves determined to go out in a blaze of glory.
So what causes leaves to fall in autumn? Basically it is a sort of specific ageing process. Auxin is a plant hormone which is produced in the leaves during the grow...
Read full Advice
Cheerful Houseplants for Autumn & Winter
The onset of dark winter evenings need not be cheerless. If the weather becomes too inclement for all but the most committed of gardeners to venture outside consider some houseplants to cheer the place up. A houseplant should be treated like a temporary house guest and not a member of the ...
Read full Advice
How To Choose & Look After a Real Christmas Tree
Tradition has it that Queen Victoria's husband, Prince Albert introduced the Christmas tree to England from his native Germany where decorating a fir tree at Christmas was a well established custom. However, it now appears that the introduction of the Christmas tree was not one of Prince Albert's ma...
Read full Advice
Festive House Plants
Now that we are in December that most festive of houseplants, the Poinsettia, is widely available. These days fabulous red poinsettias are complimented by a choice of pink, cream and variegated varieties. A Poinsettia warms up any room with its colourful bracts. The bracts are really modified leaves...
Read full Advice
Mistletoe
Mistletoe is a strange plant with a strange history. It seems to be closely associated with Scandinavian mythology. In characteristically torrid Norse style, the legend has it that an evil spirit worked mischief to contrive the death of the good looking Baldr. As a result of being struck by an arrow...
Read full Advice
Holly, Ivy & The Christmas Rose
What could be more seasonal in the plant kingdom than the Christmas Rose, Helleborus niger. Hellebores flower for a long period during the winter and their flowers are really quite large when compared to other winter flowering plants. The foliage gives a good amount of ground cover ...
Read full Advice
How to Choose & Grow Spring Flowering Bulbs
New season's bulbs come into the garden centres from mid August. The earlier you buy them the fresher they are and there will be a greater selection to choose from. Size matters in the bulb world. Top grade bulbs are larger and will produce better blooms. Avoid small shrivelled or mouldy looking bul...
Read full Advice